Dynamic Range and amplifier power

[Richard Barrett]

But there are no rules as to how one ideally ought to listen, are there? Sometimes I like to put the volume at such a level that the sound opens out properly and gives me an experience of depth and detail approaching what I might hear in a concert (or in a studio), whereas at other times I don't. I don't know if "illusion" would be the word I would use. Listening to a recording is in many ways a different kind of experience from being at a performance, not just in terms of loudness. (And the "loudness" factor can work both ways, as I can attest from having attended a harpsichord recital by the late Gustav Leonhardt in the QEH, which was pretty hard to hear in detail over the ambient sound of several hundred human beings just living and breathing in the same space!)

[pastoralguy]

I remember once, many years ago, going to hear. Alfred Brendel play Schubert in the circa 2,500 seat Usher Hall in a sold out performance. I'd looked forward to hearing the great man in 'his' repertoire for some time. Alas, I had large and fidgety people to my left and right and someone had brought a fractious infant! Of course, the inevitable happened and said infant expressed its disapproval of Brendel's playing by howling! (Not the last time this would happen at this venue either).

I do remember thinking that on that warm and airless evening that I would have much rather have been at home listening to Brendel play Schubert in the comfort of my sitting room with a whisky and my comfy chair as opposed to a, frankly, less than pleasant Usher Hall.

Of course one HOPES that a live performance will be preferable to a 'mere' recording but external factors can rule that out of court.

[richardfinegold]

And you aren't convinced ?

You seem to be convinced by global warming.

Did I say that I wasn’t? I stopped going to pop concerts when I saw Linda Rondstat when I was 20 years old and had tinnitus for a week afterward.